Fruit Punch Dianthus Kicks Up Proven Winners’ Product Lines

Proven Winners has announced the release of the Fruit Punch series of hardy dianthus in USDA Zones 4 to 9. This crop is easy to produce and provides color on retail shelves from late spring into summer, often reblooming in fall for the home gardener. Members of this series are all fully double and fragrant, blooming in rich shades of deep red, pink and bicolor flowers.

Dianthus ‘Apple Slice’ and Dianthus ‘Coconut Punch’ produce bicolor flowers with deep red edges and pink or white petals. Both of these cultivars are about 10-to-12 inches tall and offer longer flower stems, which are great for cut flowers.

For growers, it is best to bring perennial dianthus into your production in late summer to allow plants to get vernalized and bulk up over the winter. For best results, plan on providing six to nine weeks at 35°F to 40°F. Less time is
needed for flowering when temperatures warm up in spring. If you cannot provide vernalization, check with your supplier about larger vernalized plugs for a faster spring finish.

Dianthus is best grown at a 6.0 to 6.5 pH in a well-drained, peat-based media. It should not be overwatered or allowed to dry to the wilting point. Saturate the media and allow for adequate drying before watering again. Grow under high light intensities for best results.

Some perennials are at their best in warmer climates, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be used in colder areas for season-specific containers or grown with cool-crop annuals to add some unique offerings to a product mix. Here are 11 new introductions hitting retail in 2017 that are hardy in Zone 6 and up.

Customers who want to attract butterflies, bees, hummingbirds, and other pollinators to their gardens need plants that will provide food, shelter, and protection throughout the year. Consider carrying a few of these 16 pollinator-friendly perennials for retail sales in 2017.

Low maintenance, pollinator friendly, naturalistic, long-lasting — perennials are all that and more. These 21 perennials are tough enough to take the cold, ensuring they will add color and texture in the garden until the first killing frost.

Editor’s Note: In this new feature, the Greenhouse Grower varieties team will choose one noteworthy variety each month we think is worth bringing to your attention. Then we’ll share growers’ and breeders’ perspectives on the best ways to produce it successfully at your operation. This month we focus on the hardy Coreopsis UpTick series, winner of Greenhouse Grower’s 2016 Industry’s Choice Medal of Excellence for Breeding. Growing Tips From John Wilson, Seville Farms When asked about producing Coreopsis UpTick, John Wilson says he doesn’t have much to say because it was so easy to grow. Wilson, a Corporate Grower for Seville Farms, says based on the new series’ strong performance during the trialing he has done so far, the nursery ordered a large quantity of the plants for future growing. “If breeders were looking to come up with something that says ‘wow,’ they have done it with the UpTick Series,” […]

These 15 new perennials, available for retail in 2016 and 2017, will produce colorful flowers and foliage year after year, providing habitat and food for bees, butterflies, birds, moths, and other pollinators.

Perennials are becoming more mainstream as consumers look for that long-term, added value of lower maintenance, season-long color, and reblooming plants year after year. And perennial growers and retailers like them for the higher price point perennials offer. So if you’re keeping your eyes open for what’s coming next year, you’ve clicked on the right story. Flower breeders exhibiting at the 2016 California Spring Trials (CAST) have a huge crop of new perennial varieties to show off for the 2017 spring season. Before you head to California in a few weeks, take a look at the slideshow to get a preview of the colorfully delicious perennial genetics coming to the market. These new perennial introductions have all the great characteristics you’ve come to rely on from breeders. Which ones will you incorporate into production for 2017? If you missed our annuals slideshows the last couple of weeks, don’t worry — you can […]

In his latest column for Greenhouse Grower magazine, Norris says landscape plugs have the potential to pave the way for new perennial varieties and nature-based designs that appeal to consumers’ changing priorities and lifestyles.